Wherein I hold forth on faith (in general, and Judaism in particular, with occasional forays into the Quaker and Anabaptist worlds from whence I came.......), family, friends, world events, books, linguistics, grammar/usage, genealogy, knitting, and anything else that catches my attention.

Monday, November 21, 2005

Movies and more movies......

Realized the other day that I've seen more movies at the theater in the last year than in (almost) the previous decade.

So, for what it might be worth, my ratings:

Go out of your way to see:Good Night, and Good Luck(very well done! and the message is very timely)Ushpizin (very well told story)

Worth an evening admission:Wallace and Grommit (very funny; loved the book of monsters by Claude Savagely and other such tidbits)

Worth a matinee:National Treasure (an adventure without too much blood & gore -- and one that requres a bit of thinking)Mr. & Mrs. Smith (if you can suspend disbelief over the main plot point [that two married people married could hide being assassins from each other] , it is a fun couple hours; if you do see it, make sure you catch the line about getting Lucky.)A History of ViolenceNorth CountryPrime In Her Shoes

Don't bother:Just Like Heaven (excellent example of an idiot plot)40 Year Old Virgin (while the main point -- it is ok to wait for real love-- was good, just too crude overall)Wedding Crashers (just silly; while I like to be entertained when I go to the movies, I do like some substance; in other words, I'm looking for carrot cake, not cotton candy!)

And I'm sure I'll be seeing more in the next few weeks: Pride & Prejudice, Rent, Walk the Line, Syriana, Brokeback Mountain, Memoirs of a Geisha, Casanova, and Yours, Mine and Ours (the only Lucille Ball movie I ever really liked....so I'm planning to see the remake to see how much damage the modern version has done) are all coming out in the next few weeks. I may even make it into the Snickers Bar range to Cheaper by the Dozen 2 ;-) And I hope Syrian Bride makes it to this area.

I've always gone through spells of movie-watching, and this seems to be a particularly intense one. Not sure why..... maybe I'm only trying to get my money's worth from my Regal frequent viewer card (even though it was free...........).

Conversely, I'm back to being less than enthralled with television. Very little worthwhile seems to be on these days, except for a few mystery-type shows. And the recent spate of election ads didn't help matters. Glad that's over, despite my interest in politics; the ads are just overgrown children insulting each other (or so it seems to me). I think I've watched about 4 hours of tv in the last month.